Once More, With Feeling
by museless22
Summary: Sequel to True Love's Kiss. In which the curse is broken and magic has arrived.
1. Chapter 1

Henry knew the moment it happened that Emma hadn't been able to keep her promise.

He had been packing up his backpack like everyone else, preparing to leave for the day, when Miss Blanchard and his classmates seemed to seize up all at once. As one they doubled over with almost identical expressions of confusion twisting their faces. Then Miss Blanchard pressed her hand to her chest, letting out a little gasp.

Henry approached her cautiously, backpack dangling off one shoulder. "Miss Blanchard? Erm... Snow?" He almost wanted to call her 'Grandma' but that felt a little strange to be starting out with.

"Henry!" She pulled him into a bone crushing hug that lasted for several long minutes and when she finally pulled back she didn't release him entirely, hands left gently on his shoulders. The smile she gave him was so full of adoration and wonder he couldn't help but return it. "Oh Henry."

"You remember? Everything? They did it! They did it, I knew they would."

"They?" Her brows knit together in question.

"Emma and my mom. They broke the curse!"

"Emma! My daughter, my baby, I have to find her! And James... Henry, we have to find them!"

Snow was already running out the door and Henry shrugged his backpack the rest of the way on, jogging to catch up.

They'd only made it to the sidewalk when they saw the cloud rushing toward them and the world turned purple.

########

Twenty-Eight years spent staring at the same four walls. No human contact, no one to talk to, not even any memories to draw on for entertainment. Only one giant, endless stretch of time spent clawing at the walls of her cage like an animal and howling just to know her voice was still there. She was still a person. She still existed.

It was fortunate that the very nature of the curse had left her mostly unaware of it. When Bell finally returned to herself her mental faculties were more or less intact, none the worse for ware. The last thing she remembered with any clarity was being locked away in the Queen's dungeon and being told not to worry for she 'wouldn't be waiting long'. Then some indeterminate amount of time later the world was ripped asunder and now here she was with only a hazy recollection that felt more nightmare than reality.

She had only just begun to consider escape possibilities when the door to her prison swung outward, emitting a flood of light that couldn't have been very bright but none the less burned her seldom used retinas as harshly as if she had looked straight into the sun. She flinched away, throwing her arms up, overwhelmed by the sudden rush of sensory information. The world outside was all chaos; She could hear a cacophony of shouting voices that she hadn't noticed before whilst snug in her box.

When she finally dared open her eyes all she could make out was the outline of a man, tall and slender against the sickly light behind him.

"Hello there. You don't know me, but I've seen you. Many times, in the old world."

Bell tilted her head, squinting at the dark, smiling face of a middle aged man. He was barefoot and dressed as she was in a thin white gown.

"I didn't really have a name there, but you can call me Sidney. And I don't mean to alarm you but we should get out of here. _Now_."

########

When the purple haze finally dissipated they found Emma wandering down Main Street, clutching a sword in her hand and looking frantic. She might have charged right into them if Snow hadn't called her name, drawing the blonde's attention and bringing her up short. For a moment they simply stood and looked at each other and then Snow rushed forward to wrap her daughter up in her arms, all but sobbing.

"Emma! You came back for us! My darling girl, I knew you would!" She drew back, cradling Emma's face tenderly in her gloved hands and for a moment Emma was smaller than Henry had ever seen her. Gone was the white knight, the sheriff, and in her place was the scared, lonely little girl who had made her entire life about her hunt for her parents.

"SNOW!"

They all three turned to see David- Now James once again- standing at the corner by the diner, his red flannel shirt hanging haphazardly off his shoulders and looking out of breath. He ran to them and threw his arms around Emma and his wife, laughing uproariously as he rocked them in place.

Someone else yelled for Snow and there was Leroy, walking down the street in a sort of formation with six other men Henry recognised from around town. Ruby and Her grandmother weren't far behind, the both of them with tears streaming down their cheeks. Henry was wondering just how big this group hug might get when Emma suddenly pulled away from her parents, jaw set in a rigid line.

"Can we save this whole family reunion thing for later? Over a drink? Or twenty? I have to find Regina."

Snow and James both bristled, wearing similar expressions of distaste, but Henry piped up before they could question her, "What do you mean? Wasn't she with you?"

"Yes, we were-" Emma's skin turned an interesting shade of pink. "We broke the curse. And then that cloud thing came and when it cleared she was gone."

"Wait. You and _Regina_ broke the curse?" James looked from Henry to Emma, brows raising in disbelief. "How?"

"It was this whole true love thing, I guess?" Emma shrugged, looking distinctly uncomfortable. "We kissed and then the cloud- And you all remember and- I think that's what did it, right? I mean you knew it would, didn't you?"

She looked to Henry for confirmation and he nodded emphatically. "I think so. But I don't think the cloud was part of it. It happened after they woke up."

"Hold on. You think Regina's your true love?" Snow was staring at her daughter with something like horror. "Oh Emma, sweetheart, she's- I really don't think- It must have been something else."

"No. I _felt _it. Mary- Snow, I love her. And I have to find her. If that _whatever_ it was wasn't part of the curse..." She stiffened. "Gold. He took that potion thinger, he must have done something."

"Magic." Mother Superior- Or whoever she was now, Henry wasn't sure- joined the growing group clustered on the sidewalk, the rest of the nuns trailing behind her like so many ducklings. She was solemn in her conservative blue sweater, hair pulled into a long braid that hung down her back. "The mist brought magic to this land. I can feel it."

"Magic? Regina will have her powers back, Emma don't you see? She must have planned this somehow, she'll _slaughter _us." James reached for his daughter beseechingly, the frown of discomfort adorning her face stopping him just short of touching her.

"She wouldn't. Whoever you knew before, she doesn't exist anymore. She has her heart back, she loves me-" Emma gestured wildly as she spoke, avoiding taking Leroy's head off with the blade she had clearly forgotten she was holding only by grace of the man's short stature.

"_Emma_-"

"If the love is true, there's nothing to be done." Mother Superior fixed Snow with a stern, knowing look, and Henry was surprised to see the entirety of the people gathered listening to her speak with something akin to reverence.

Would it be rude to ask her outright who she was? Henry opened his mouth, screwing up his courage, but Snow cut him off. "She's our daughter. She's the Savior. She can't be- Regina cursed us in the first place, how can she be Emma's true love?"

"Hey, standing right here guys." Emma scowled. "Look, I don't even know what 'true love' means, honestly. We broke the curse. I'm going to find her. Then I'm going to figure out what the _hell _Gold did to this town. You can help or you can get out of my way."

And then she was off again, spine rigid with grim determination, and Henry followed after without a second thought. He didn't look round to see but judging by the grumbling voices and shuffle of feet half the town was behind them.

########

She was far enough and high enough that she couldn't hear the angry mob forming in the town below as they bayed for her blood but she could still see the majority of Storybrooke's lights, so many fireflies glittering in the crisp night air. Once they got their heads together enough to start combing through the woods her hiding place would no longer be secure, but it would do well enough for the night.

Regina was shivering, still dressed in the casual jeans, blouse and the long coat she had donned that morning before setting out with Emma, but her attempt to start a small, readily enough concealed magical fire had failed spectacularly. Instead of flames springing from her fingertips it had been a flood of brightly hued butterflies that she still hadn't entirely gotten rid of. They fluttered around her as she sat with her knees to her chest and her back snug up against a gnarled tree trunk, one or two alighting in her hair and making her skin crawl. Their silvery wings almost glittered in the moonlight when it dared to peek out from behind its cover of clouds.

They might have been lovely, if she'd been in any mood to appreciate them.

She wasn't even sure if the miscast had been a result of the difference in magic in this world (Though she had tried to perform the reverse with no result other than feeling ridiculous) or a failing entirely her own. Her heart, newly restored, was so full of giddy emotion it was entirely possible she had only herself to blame.

Regina kept the tips of her fingers pressed against the pulse point at her wrist even as her body shuddered from the chill in her bones, reveling in the sensation of the steady beat through her veins. She hadn't realized how much she'd missed it, though it made the pain of leaving more acute.

She had used the confusion caused by the flood of magic bringing purple fog to flee shortly after replacing her heart and the kiss that had finally broken her curse. She had no doubt that it was somehow tied to Rumpel's endgame but wasn't inclined to worry about it when it had provided her with such a brilliant out.

Regina felt she should probably have been more upset at the shattering of her self made happy ending, but her emotions seemed to have taken on a life of their own and it was hard to process much of anything to its fullest extent. She went through bouts of insane joy and overwhelming affection down to crushing sadness and rage and then back up again. She'd been laughing and crying like a madwoman and could only hope that when things finally settled themselves she would be able to survive her longing for Henry and Emma.

Somewhere down there they were reuniting with their family, free at last. It would have to be enough to know that they were happy.

She still had no idea where she was going to run to; Twenty-Eight years and she had never seen anything of the new world she inhabited beyond Storybrooke.

A city, maybe, where she could get lost in the sea of faces. It wouldn't be easy; Outside of Storybrooke her lack of knowledge of this world and its workings would be readily apparent. It was one thing to live in a town she had control over, surrounded by familiar faces. It would be quite another to venture out into a strange land all alone.

The thought bred a strange homesickness.

"Planning to kill us all with a plague of butterflies? Gotta say, you're loosing your touch Your Majesty."

Regina all but jumped out of her own skin, on her feet in a rush of motion that sent a swarm of silver fluttering everywhere. She hadn't heard so much as a rustle or snapping twig to indicate that anyone was approaching. She could feel her heart pounding like mad somewhere around the area of her throat as she scanned the dark tree line, but all she could see was a shadow, dark and nimble. For a moment she contemplated running; She'd never been much of a fighter, not with her fists. Her skills lay in magic and in subtlety. Manipulation.

Then the shadow got close enough to reveal Ruby's-Red's- visage, pale in her dark hoodie and knit cap that reminded Regina so much of Emma's extensive collection it ached, and she dismissed the thought. Regina had no delusions; She'd never outrun the wolf-girl, certainly not in the environment Red was most suited to.

"What do you want?"

"Everyone's looking for you. Of course, they don't have my nose." Red tapped a finger to the side of her own face, smiling. Her teeth flashed brilliantly white in the moonlight and Regina could well imagine the wolf, stalking its prey through the woods. "Don't worry. There's no one here but me. They don't know where I've gone and I won't tell them, if that's what you want."

Regina felt some of the tension melt out of her spine to know there was no parade of villagers with pitchforks following behind the werewolf's lead but didn't relax entirely. "Why would you do that for me? After everything I've done to you and yours?"

Red's smile fell away. "Because the Princess loves you. I saw it before the curse broke- Hell, I encouraged it. And I see it now. I can put aside how much I don't like you for her sake."

"Then leave me be. I'll be long gone before the morning comes."

"Look, I'm not turning you in but I really think you should go back. Emma- She's so worried." Red stepped forward with her hands raised in earnest, light footed so that she didn't make so much as a crackle as she moved over the layer of dead leaves and fallen branches that covered the ground. The butterflies had settled again and Regina could see one on the girl's shoulder, flexing its wings.

Regina's breath plumed in a small white cloud before her as she let it out in a huff. "No. This is what's best. For Emma. For my son. It's better they be free of me."

"You're not doing what's right for Emma and Henry, you're doing what's right for _you_."

Regina scowled. "Whatever do you mean, dear?"

"You're taking the coward's way out. You're running because you're afraid of being punished. Maybe you will be, maybe you won't. You probably deserve it. But Emma would _never_ let them hurt you and _she_ deserves more than this."

Her confidence returned anew at the accusation and Regina bridged the remaining gap between them menacingly, fingers flexing as though she would very much like to wrap them round Red's neck. And maybe she did, she couldn't even be sure; This murderous, writhing thing inside her was as intense as any other feeling she'd been graced with in the last few hours and it was hard to say if she genuinely wished the girl harm or if her irritation was merely blowing itself way out of proportion. "I am a great many things, _Red_, most of them unpleasant but I am no coward."

"Prove it. Come back with me."

That would be the selfish thing, wouldn't it? She wanted Emma. She wanted Henry.

She wanted them to want her, too. Even now, when they knew who she was and what she'd done and couldn't possibly forgive her for it.

Regina deflated. Red was right, of course, just for the wrong reasons. She wasn't afraid of punishment; She was afraid of what Emma and Henry would now think of her. Afraid of rejection. _Spineless_.

'_They're going to hate me...'_

'_Maybe. But at least you'll have faced it.'_

Funny, how the little voice in the back of her head sounded like Emma.

"Okay."

########

The town was eerily still as they walked through the streets, side by side. No matter what Red said, it still felt like a perp walk. Snow's loyal dog, bringing her in to face justice. She didn't know what retribution Snow would demand of her, or how much Emma would allow her mother to take, but she felt she would be very luck to escape the axe.

They were headed, it seemed, for the diner and Regina wondered if they mightn't have set up some sort of base there. It was almost amusing to imagine Snow and her Charming, sitting at a booth working out war strategy over pie and hot chocolate.

Would Emma be with them, waiting to throw her in irons?

Red stopped suddenly, grabbing Regina by the elbow and standing so still she didn't even look to be breathing. "Wait. I hear something. Something's not right."

But then Regina could hear them too, harsh voices raised in anger and drunken laughter. She couldn't distinguish any words from the den to know what they were saying but Red clearly could and her nostrils flared with alarm.

"Come on, we have to get you out of here."

"There she is!"

"KILL THE WITCH!"

A massive throng of people rounded the street corner before Red could spirit her away, roaring like a many headed beast. She was gratified, at least, to see that they had dispensed with the torches and farming equipment, though probably only for the lack of means.

Whale, of all people, was at the fore, calling loudly for her head, though perhaps she should have seen that one coming. The man had plenty reason to hate her.

They all did, really.

Red was swept aside in the rush of hard, grabbing hands. Regina could hear the girl struggling, protesting, but no one was listening and then Whale had the former queen by the throat and Regina lost her in the crowd and the sudden press of very real, very immediate terror.

He was so close Regina could see the individual chisels of color on his irises, gleaming manically in the street light, and smell the whiskey on his breath as it washed over her warm and heavy.

"Now you're going to pay."


	2. Chapter 2

Once More, With Feeling (2/?)

Fandom: Once Upon a Time

Rating: M. Very tame M.

Pairings: Swan Queen

Disclaimers: Don't own the characters or anything else from the show. Just borrowing for a bit.

Summary: Sequel to True Love's Kiss. In which the curse is broken and magic has arrived.

A/N: Look guys, I wrote almost-smut. I think I'm growing as a person. XD

########

It was crude, the pyre they had made for her. They had stacked up pallets from the grocery store, fence posts, boxes, anything they could get their hands on it seemed. And the center piece, the thing she was to be lashed to? Her tree. Crudely felled and drooping sadly beneath the weight of its rotten fruit.

_'Rotten to the core.'_

If she were to wax philosophical she might have found it fitting that this last, pure piece of her childhood had met its end on the day she was to die. Innocence lost and all, though truly that ship had sailed long ago.

Judging by the stench they had doused the monstrosity in some sort of fuel, gasoline maybe. It took a concentrated effort not to wretch as it rolled over her and turned her stomach.

Regina had tried to fight them off with magic but every time she reached for the flow that had once come as easily to her as breathing it failed her. Then, worse, when she had closed her eyes and tried to find her center, that place inside her where Emma and Henry lived if she was being honest, had unleashed another skittering wave of butterflies that had sent the assembled mob into fits of laughter.

"She's powerless!"

"Burn her!"

They were laughing still, while she strained at the ropes they'd tied around her hands until her wrists cracked and bled, and someone handed Whale a broomstick that had its straw head lit aflame.

"You took away our happiness! Our families! Our entire world! Your crimes against us are too numerous to even mention and now we cast judgement."

Who was he, to decide her fate? Regina wanted to rip his eyes out, punch that smug smirk off his face, and this at last was genuine emotion accurate in its intensity. She'd have his heart if she had to claw it out with her bare fingers. If they wanted an evil queen she would give them one they would never forget.

Only she couldn't. She was going to stand there, raging impotently, while her skin cracked and blackened, capable of nothing more than screaming.

Somehow the thought of being helpless in the face of it was worse than that of death itself.

"What do you think, Highness?" Whale grabbed her by the chin, forcing her to look him in the eye, though when he next spoke it was with strange tenderness. "Is there any soul left in there to burn?"

"LET HER GO! Let her go! Let her go!"

The crowd parted as a head of blond curls pushed, shoved and elbowed her way through their ranks, quicker as they realized who she was. Emma, their savior, with her parents and Red close at her heels.

And Henry, dear sweet Henry, wide eyed and toddling after them, his school back pack bouncing around his shoulders with every step.

Regina sagged against her bonds. It was her worst nightmare come to life, Henry there to watch her executed. _'You did this to yourself!'_

_'You deserve this.'_

Then Emma was pushing Whale away, ferocious in her rage. "Get your hands off her! What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Whale regained his footing enough to stand defiant, disheveled though he was. "Exacting justice."

"Ju-This isn't justice, its murder!" Emma placed her body between his and Regina's, hands out stretched to push him away again if need be, wary of the burning torch he still held in his hands.

The scent of supple red leather and all that was uniquely Emma was like a balm to Regina's soul. She closed her eyes and let it overwhelm her, nearly trembling in relief.

Her Lady Knight hadn't come to further condemn her but to save her, yet again.

"We aren't of this world."

"No but you're in it and I'm still the sheriff."

"She deserves to be punished!" Whale lifted his burning broomstick in emphasis and there was a rumbling of agreement from the mob at his back.

"She will be." Snow had joined her daughter, fitting easily once more into the role of benevolent monarch, and Regina opened her eyes to glare at the other woman's back even as she felt a wash of gratitude. Stupid girl. Stupid selfish girl and her kindness. Everyone's friend. "But not like this. We'll lock her up. It's the safest thing for her. And for all of us."

Emma's head turned to regard her mother and for a moment she looked like she might protest but held her tongue.

"Now go, return to your homes and your families. This should be a day of celebration, not hate."

Whale's teeth were bared, fists clenched, looking very much like he wasn't ready to let it go, but he backed off with others, throwing the broom aside so that it lay fizzling angrily on the street as the gathered crowd dissipated.

Emma waited until the last of them had gone before falling to her knees at Regina's feet and reaching for the ropes that bound her to the tree with fingers that were clumsy in their haste. When she'd freed the bleeding wrists, still staining Regina's sleeves with a steady crimson trickle, she kissed them, careful of the raw, reddened flesh. She might have kissed elsewhere too, everything she could reach, just to know every bit of the body in front of her was still whole and alive, if not for Snow's hand suddenly on her shoulder and the uncomfortable clearing of a throat.

Behind them Charming looked like he would throttle Regina himself while Red, an arm thrown protectively about Henry's shoulders, merely grinned. Henry himself was smiling that crooked little smile he shared with his birth-mother and Regina ached with the longing to wrap him up in her arms.

Snow was a little pink around the ears as she said, "There's a time and a place, Sweetheart. We really shouldn't linger here."

########

It invoked a different kind of fear, being locked in a cell. Much of her life had been spent in cages, from the very real confinement her mother had oft imposed upon her when she had been a willful child to the metaphorical walls of her marriage and the curse she'd walked into open eyed and willing. As soon as the bars slid shut she knew she wasn't going to last long with her sanity intact; It was too small and too dark and when had it gotten so hard to breathe?

"So I'm your prisoner." It was a small victory that her voice didn't fail her.

"For now." The green of Emma's eyes served as the anchor Regina so needed and she latched onto them as she leaned her weight against the door of her cell, wrapping her fingers about the bars..

"Emma-"

"You guys take Henry home, will you? I'll stand guard. I don't think they'll try anything else tonight but..." Emma swallowed thickly, finally turning to face her parents who were standing together by her desk with near identical frowns. "If anything happens and I'm not- I need to be here."

"Emma, I really don't think that's a good idea." Snow said slowly, cautious. Regina thought she'd sooner gnaw off her own arm than leave the daughter she'd only just had returned to her alone with the witch who'd torn her family apart in the first place, but she was worried, too, about alienating the blond. "Come home with us? We can talk. You must have so many questions."

"Not tonight. Frankly, the biggest questions I have right now aren't ones you can answer." Emma sighed, scrubbing at her face with the back of her hand. "Look, we'll do the catching up thing. We will. Just not now. Not tonight. I can't deal with it yet."

"But-" James cut Snow off with a look, a gentle squeeze of her shoulder, saying in an undertone, "Let it go."

Emma crouched down before Henry, ruffling his hair. "Have fun with your grandparents, okay? Maybe you can show them the game-cube. Bet they don't have that in fairy tale land."

Henry hugged her tight and Regina couldn't help the green eyed monster that roared up inside her breast at the sight. Then he was pulling away from his blond mother and reaching through the bars, a small uncertain smile on his face. She took hold of his tiny hand, pressing the barest of kisses to his knuckles.

"Don't worry, mom. Emma'll keep you safe. It'll be okay."

Snow and James still looked reluctant to leave as Henry joined them but Emma wasn't taking no as an answer. She stood, hands on hips, every inch the warrior she'd been born to become. Regina wondered who she felt herself to be most in that moment; The sheriff, the primary authority of a small town in Main? The bail-bonds person? Or the savior destined to free an entire people?

"You'll call if you need us?"

"Of course." Emma gestured at the sword now leaning up against the sheriff's desk like a sentry. "Relax, guys, I'm covered. Killed a dragon today, remember? I think I can handle myself."

When they'd gone Emma turned on her boot heel, reaching through the bars suddenly to gently grasp Regina's face before pulling her into the sweetest, most awkwardly positioned kiss she'd ever experienced. By the time the need for oxygen bid they part she was convinced she must have marks down her skin from the press of cold steel.

"Oh." Somehow she didn't think she would ever entirely get her breath back. Not when Emma was standing there, looking at her like _that_. "I thought you would hate me."

"You know, I did too. Maybe its this whole, fairy tale love thing, I don't know. Somehow you got in and I can't get you out."

Emma circled her thumbs, wiping away tears Regina hadn't even noticed were there. She couldn't help but smile at the sheriff's lack of eloquence. Ever with the crude but endearing."_True_ love, dear. Fairy Tale implies a myth and it's probably the most real thing in all the worlds."

"True. Right. Everyone keeps tossing that word around but no one can seem to explain to me exactly what it means. What is it, like, destiny? Because I don't think I was _destined_ to love you. I think a lot of weird circumstances lined up to bring me to this point, but it's my choice. It has to be my choice." She sounded almost desperate and Regina felt the stirrings of uncharacteristic guilt. Of course no one _wanted_ to hear that they were somehow fated to fall for an Evil Queen.

"Is it, dear? Do we ever really _choose_ to love _anyone_?" Regina sighed. "True love is- It's a little like fate, yes, or what you might call soul mates. It's magic. Powerful magic. Where we're from, it's understood that everyone has a true love. One true love. One chance at eternal happiness, if you can find them."

"That's... Depressing, actually."

"Indeed. In a world where marriage is usually about who has the biggest dowry," Or about whoever your parents pawned you off on, as the case may have been, "Well... Yes, depressing is apt. Although I'm sure it's possible to be content without it." She hadn't been. Thinking that one chance was lost to her forever had been devastating in ways they were _all_ still feeling. But to live without ever having had it at all, that might be bearable. You couldn't miss something you'd never had, could you? "At any rate, it's generally considered sacred."

"Generally?"

Emma raised a single eyebrow and Regina dearly wished there was more space between the bars so she could kiss it. She settled for grasping one of Emma's hands, still cradling her cheeks. "Some would do anything to ruin the happiness of others."

She was including herself under that umbrella, though she was sure Emma didn't know the extent of it.

"So you're mine- And I'm your- Talk about commitment pressure."

"It would certainly seem so. We broke the curse, after all. But Emma, it doesn't have to mean anything you don't want it to. Magic is different here, I'm not even sure it works the same- It could be the curse would have been broken by _anyone_ you had deep feelings for."

Emma searched her eyes for a long moment, lips quirking. "You don't believe that, though."

"How do you-"

"Human polygraph, remember?"

"Oh. Right."

"Sooo... eternal happiness, huh? That could be nice. I draw the line at riding off into the sunset though. Horses and me, we don't mix."

Regina laughed, the sound hollow to her own ears, and they lapsed into a silence that was deep but not uncomfortable, content to be still. Everything ached, Regina realized She was going to have bruises in some interesting places, most of them due to Whale's manhandling. The thought of the man who had very nearly killed her led her down darker roads, the malice she'd felt in that moment simmering just beneath the surface.

Was that _ever_ going to go away?

"I wanted to kill him." She said finally, staring at the wall over the sheriff's shoulder rather than look her in the eye. Funny, that it looked the same as it always had. You would never know that the woman who ran it was really a princess from another world. If not for the sword, anchoring this land with the old, it might have been any sheriff's station in any little town.

"What?"

"Whale. I wanted to kill him. I thought about it-" In graphic detail, no less. Even now she could close her eyes and imagine what it might be like to hold his still beating heart in her hands. "That darkness is still very much a part of me. I think it always will be. And I don't think I can control it. That is what you are getting yourself into, Emma. That is what fate has tied you to, if you choose to accept it."

"Maybe that's why I _have_ to."

Regina snorted her disbelief and tried to pull away and leave the sheriff standing at the door to her cage alone, but Emma held on. Stubborn. Always stubborn. Even when what she was after wasn't particularly good for her.

"Hear me out. You're crazycakes, but I'm grounded. Mostly. That has to balance out somehow. And I _think_ we can give you a pass for wanting to hurt the guy who was about to burn you alive. I wanted to kill him a little bit too."

Regina kissed her again then, a gentle pressing of lips that lasted until she could no longer stand the barrier between them. Emma had a little red indent on the side of her forehead from the effort. "Under different circumstances, Sheriff, I might have told you to just grab your handcuffs and get in here."

"I still could." Emma fished a hand in her jeans pocket, emerging with a little silver key she waggled in her fingers. "You be the inmate, I'll be the warden... It's not a big stretch but creativity's not my strong suit."

"How about... You be Emma, I be Regina and there's no magic, no evil, no queens or heroes, no other worlds but this one. No fate. Just normal. Just two people with really amazing chemistry and... A drab cot in the corner, but I suppose no fantasy is perfect."

"I think I can do that."

In the end it was the wall that took the brunt of it, Regina's back pressed against the unforgiving brick as Emma finally got to have her kisses, light as the damned butterflies, down the curve of her neck to her clavicle where the blond lingered. She sucked the smooth flesh there between her lips, making the blood rise to the surface in little pinpricks and no doubt leaving behind a mark that wouldn't fade for days. "When Red came to find us I thought- I thought we would be too late."

She returned to Regina's mouth, nipping her bottom lip before soothing it with a gentle tongue and stealing another breath taking kiss. "I've never been so afraid."

It was as Emma's fingers moved within her, curling and picking up a rhythm that left her only able to gasp and moan, that she felt it. Magic. It pulsed and ebbed between them like a current and she couldn't tell if it originated with herself or Emma, though the blond gave no indication of having noticed (Granted she was too absorbed in her quest to mark every inch of flesh she could sink her teeth into at that point to absorb much in the way of extraneous information.). She reached for the power and it responded in a way that it hadn't before, her body burning with the warm glow of it, and she knew in that moment she could make something happen if she wanted to. No more helplessness.

Then Emma's thumb landed on her clit and she was coming undone, eyes fluttering shut of their own volition, a litany of nonsense mostly consisting of the blonde's name ripped from her throat. By the time she had recovered from the aftershocks, Emma's fingers gently pulsing her through it, the magic had abandoned her again.

Magic was different here. The key before had always been her rage. Here in this world it must come from a different place. A place of love. Somehow she had to harness that feeling for future use.

The thought was stolen away as Emma kissed her again, lost to the back recesses of her mind.

########

The cot wasn't in anyway big enough for two but they were making a decent run at it, Regina mostly curled up on top of Emma while the sheriff trailed her fingers gently through the dark hair draping her shoulder over and over again. It was still dark out but looking greyer all the while; Emma felt she probably should have tried to sleep but the moment was so peaceful she didn't care to leave it just yet.

"Gold." She said finally, brows knitting together as she frowned at the ceiling. "I still have to figure out what that whole magic fog thing was all about. And why we didn't go back, I guess." She wasn't particularly bothered about that one, not being sucked into bizzarro fairy tale land was just fine by Emma, but Snow-And she didn't know how she was ever going to get used to calling her that- had expressed concern.

"Rumpelstiltskin, dear."

"I know. But Gold is a helluva lot easier to say."

"The fog, It brought magic but it doesn't work the way it's supposed to." Regina's fingers clenched, making an almost claw like gesture, and the brunette sighed wistfully.

Emma frowned as the limb fell back to rest on her chest. "What do you mean?"

"I am- I was a witch powerful enough to curse an entire world. Do you really think I would let the likes of Whale truss me up if I had full use of my powers?"

"No, I guess not."

Regina's tone softened. "I don't know if he can use it, Rumpel, if he's figured it out yet. Be careful. I have no idea what he wants from all this."

"I'll see if Red can come... Keep an eye on things. I hate to leave you here but-"

"Evil Queen. Snug behind bars is where I belong. Got it."

Emma spent a moment listening to the beating of their hearts so close together and resolved to enjoy the last few hours remaining before sunrise and she was expected to play savior again.


	3. Chapter 3

A/N: So, I'm not really the biggest Rumbelle shipper (I'm sorry, they're cute and all, just, you know, not exactly lesbians.) so I'm going to apologize for any butchering I've done here.

########

By the time night had fallen the little town that had been torn asunder's attention was so divided-The Royals and those loyal to them plotting to restore order in the diner and the rest forming an enraged mob- that no one noticed the two figures dressed in their stolen hospital scrubs as they tread down the sidewalk. They were just two more shadows, flitting from street lamp to street lamp, only the black, empty windows of down town's abandoned shops to witness their passing.

Sidney kept a firm hand on the girl's wrist as she stumbled along behind him. This was her first glimpse of the strange new world she'd been living in for the last near two decades and everything was either interesting or frightening and either way he didn't relish the thought of chasing her down again if she decided to wander off as she seemed to have a mind to.

"What's that? With the wheels? Do people ride in those? Like carriages? How does it work, exactly? Magic? I wonder-"

"Listen, I'm going to take you to a man. Mr. Gold. He'll take care of you. He is- Well, he was- you'll see. Just trust me when I say he's going to want to see you."

Bell pulled up short, the sudden stop jerking Sidney's arm harshly. He turned to look at her, irritable, and was met with wide, questioning eyes. She was in quite a state, her hair matted and tangled, lips trembling from the cold their shabby attire didn't alleviate in the slightest. "Why are you doing this? Why are you helping me?"

Because he had been a prisoner his entire life, first a slave to a magic lamp and then to his heart and an evil queen's mirror and finally in that hell hole of an asylum when he'd out worn his usefulness. No one in the old world had even known his name and no one in this world remembered poor, Sidney Glass who had been quietly made to look like he'd suffered a mental break down after he lost the sheriff's election but he knew and he remembered and he was _free_ now. There was just one thing left, one remaining tether to be rid of and he would be his own man again.

And, too, because if anyone in either world could relate to the life he'd lived, it was this girl. They'd the both of them been trapped far longer than any person should ever have to be.

"Because you're going to tell Mr. Gold who locked you up. And then he's going to make everything better."

########

Once, he might have done a victory dance. A celebratory giggle, a little toast to himself for a job well done. Now he was a mortal man, with an achy leg and a heavy heart, and mostly he was just tired. He had a lot of world to search yet and at this point it was only an assumption that any of it had been worth it.

Rumpelstiltskin surveyed the stack of travel guides he'd spread across the counter top one last time before gathering them up and stuffing them in his bag. There was no way to know for sure where Bae was, or _if_ Bae was, no way to narrow it down. He had a long, desperate road before him.

The little bell over the shop door tinkled and he couldn't quite tape down the irritation that flared in his chest. He didn't even bother to look around at the intruder- Regina and her champion, the Charmings, it didn't matter. He had nothing left for any of them. "The shop's closed. I'll be doing no more dealing tonight.

"Rumpel-Rumpelstiltskin? It really is you."

For a moment he thought he was hallucinating. There was no possible way she could be here; He'd finally cracked and lost whatever was left of his mind. Then he was turning and she was there, rushing into his arms. Solid, whole. Bell. Bell who was dead. Bell who he'd never quite stopped mourning.

He stood numb in her embrace until it sunk in, finally wrapping her in his arms as tight as he could, as though to merge their very skin. She was just as he remembered, right down to the smell of her hair and the color of her eyelashes. "You're real? You're alive! You're alive."

Which meant he had been lied to. He had been lied to and he'd fallen for it. Or Regina had been lied to. It was possible.

"Oh my darling Bell. You have to tell me- What happened to you?" He pulled back, cradling her face in his hands, smoothing the unruly locks that fell about her cheeks. She was, now that he took a closer look at her, a little worse for ware. Shivering, tangled hair, dressed in flimsy blue scrubs and ill fitted white sneakers. Thinner, too. Hollow.

"I was abducted."

He didn't need to hear her say the name. No mistake had been made; It had been deliberate. All of it deliberate.

"Regina, she locked me away. Before her curse. And then here, in that place. The asylum."

"For twenty-eight years? For twenty-eight years you've been here, alive?"

She nodded slowly, then smiled and it was possibly the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. "Yes. But I'm here now, and I love you."

"I love you too." And he kissed her then, sweetly little by little, but inside he was burning, his travel plans and exhaustion lost beneath his seething, coiling rage.

########

By the time Red arrived Emma had returned to the proper side of the cell doors, though she had taken up a seat atop the desk nearby. The girl took one look at the pair of them, lost in their own little world where communication seemed to consist purely of smoldering stares, and rolled her eyes. It was a very Ruby like gesture and for a moment she felt strange in her own skin. It was weird, having two people in one head, never really sure where one ended and the other began, but she shook it off. She'd dealt with the beast inside her for a very long time, what was one personality more?

"Okay, break it up. Snow's having kittens if you don't get over their soon she's going to storm the place."

Emma rose, boots slapping the ground as the blond inelegantly slid to her feet, and Red took a moment to appreciate that here stood the baby she had once felt kicking in the womb, the tiny little miracle she had never gotten the chance to lay eyes on. Her best friend's baby, a woman grown. Then fierce green eyes were turning to appraise her and that was all Charming, the stance and the protectiveness. The chin though, that was Snow's.

"You keep her safe."

"And keep her in there too, huh?"

Emma tilted her head in an unamused way and Red sighed. "I got it. I'm on your side, remember?" She gestured at her face, sporting a nasty purpleing black eye courtesy of the mob she'd attempted to fight off. "Relax, kid. I won't let anything happen to your woman."

Emma shared one last long look with Regina, and it was almost eerie how the intensity of it mirrored what Snow and James had, though Red suspected none of them would care for the comparison. Then she seemed to steel herself and stalked off, scooping up her father's sword as she went.

After the blond's retreating footsteps had finally faded Red took up a seat behind the sheriff's desk, making a desperate bid to look anywhere but at the prisoner she was meant to be guarding. It was too awkward. Ruby would have teased the mayor, delighted in the fruits of her and Henry's labor, but Red was mortified. Emma was her best friend's baby and this was the Evil Queen, a woman said friend hated, and they were _totally_ banging and it was all Red's fault.

And if she could get Ruby's colorful colloquialisms out of her head everything would be so much better.

"If you hurt her I'll kill you." Red said finally, when there was just no more interest to be had in the sheriff's letter opener. She could be the protective big sister, the friend. It was the role she might have played, had there been no curse and everything turned out as it should.

Brown eyes stared at her through the bars, not blinking for so long Red's watered in sympathy. Then, finally, "I'm afraid it's far to late for that. But if it makes you feel any better I mean to make up for it."

"Yeah, well. We'll see."

"I do... appreciate... what you tried to do for me. What you did for me. You could have walked away and let me die and Emma would have been none the wiser."

She sounded pained admitting it and Red supposed the entire situation must be as awkward for Regina as well. How exactly did one deal with finding out their true love also happened to be the daughter of a woman they hated so much they'd cursed an entire world to punish her?

Not that Red could talk. She'd eaten hers.

"Right thing to do. I'd do it again."

A strange scent teased Red's nose, something new. Like sweat and earth and parchment and other human fleshy things and she was on her feet before she could quite think about it. Someone was in the building with them. Someone she didn't recognize. "Shh. Hold on, I think someone's here."

She tread slowly out into the dark hallway, head tilted as she listened for the tell tale footsteps. Something shuffled behind her and she turned just in time to catch something solid and sharp in the temple.

########

"How's mom?"

Emma shifted in an almost guilty way, not quite meeting Henry's eyes as she mussed his hair in greeting. She looked a little ruffled, blond curls sticking up in the back and dark circles bruising her eyes and he wondered if she'd sat awake all night, holding vigil. "Good. Safe. Still locked up."

Henry smiled broadly. "Of course she is. You're her White Knight I knew you would protect her."

"Yeah, look kid, I need you to stay with Granny for a little while, okay? You're grandparents and I need to go see Mr. Gold."

"Why can't I come? I can help-"

"Woah buddy." James and Snow had joined them on the threshold of the apartment Mary Margaret and Emma had shared as roommates, already dressed and ready to go, and the man clapped Henry on the shoulder affectionately. It was still a little strange to think of the man formerly known as David as his Grandfather, but he was growing fonder of the idea all the while. Who else could say they had _the_ Prince Charming to look up to? "You can help by keeping safe and staying out of trouble, okay?"

Of course, he could do without all the extra protectiveness.

"Okay. I'm going to keep looking in my book anyway, maybe there's something in there about why we didn't get sent back." He couldn't remember ever having read such a passage but it was possible he missed it. He was so taken with the idea that he didn't notice the tension in the air, that strange and cautious approach Emma had adopted with her parents since being reunited with them. There was still so much discomfort there.

They dropped him at the diner on their way to the pawnshop, book snug under his arm. He couldn't help a little glow of satisfaction at the extra warmth attached to the greetings he received from the familiar faces gathered there.

He wasn't just that silly kid, the crazy boy any more. They all believed and his story was going to have a happy ending too.

########

"Where's Red?"

"Taking a little nap."

Regina was on her feet and clinging to the bars of her cell, a wary animal trapped in a cage and Rumpelstiltskin tapped his cane with a little hint of smugness. "We need to have a chat, you and I."

"What do you want, Rumpel? Going to kill me? Finish what those idiots started?"

"No, you're quite safe from me." _'Don't kill her.'_ Bell had begged him,_ 'Don't give in to your hate!'_ and he had promised. He didn't know that he could do it with his own two hands anyway, didn't think he could look her in the eye as the life slipped away from her. He was weak, here, still, even with magic restored to him.

"I feel so relieved." Her lips raised in an almost snarl and she was itching, he could just tell, to have command of her magic back. Anxious without any weapons with which to defend herself.

"I made someone a promise that I wouldn't kill you, and I shan't." He limped over to her cell, setting the cane aside as his gloved hand delved into his coat pocket. Her dark eyes watched him, following his every movement, but not so cautious as to draw away from him. She thought him powerless still, he was sure. Which was true, to an extent, but she should have been far more concerned.

"Who could elicit that from you?"

"Bell."

He could see it, that brief flicker of shock before she composed her mask, and he wondered how he could have possibly missed it before. A shift of the eyes, a twitch of the lips, blatantly obvious tells that she'd always had and yet when they'd been most important he had missed them. Had she simply grown less adept, soft after all these years, or was it truly his own failing?

"Bell's alive?"

"You are a dreadful liar." He pressed his face close to the bars, teeth bared, and for a moment he was taken back, to a time when he had been the one in the cell. Funny, how the tables turned.

"I could have killed her, but I didn't."

"Yeah, you did much worse than that. You kept her alive so you could kill her when it suited you."

He'd been foolish. He'd thought he had distanced himself from his creation-for _his_ she was, right down to her DNA though she didn't know it- but somehow he had grown attached enough to forget he had molded a monster. He had never allowed himself to think of her in terms of _'daughter'_, could never allow himself to think of her as more than a tool if she was to be shaped into the sort of creature that could cast the darkest of curses, but somewhere a long the line she had become something like a_ friend_. The constant back and forth, the one-upmanship, had been more a game than actual antagonism, just another way to teach her, and he'd grown fond of it.

Foolish. Foolish to think she wouldn't take the opportunity to hurt him if it arose.

"A fate worse than death. Which, incidentally, is exactly what I have in store for you."

He grabbed her by the back of the hand, still wrapped around her cell door as she glared at him defiantly, and pulled until he had her entire arm trapped beneath his. The surprise of it worked in his favor and she struggled in his grip as futilely as a fish on a hook. He heard her gasp as he pulled the golden medallion from his pocket and he smiled. Of course she recognized the symbol emblazoned on the trinket's surface, and knew exactly what it meant.

"Is that-"

"Yes, dearie. The one thing no one can escape- destiny. And yours is particularly unpleasant."

He pressed the medallion against her palm while she continued to thrash and twist, gritting his teeth from the effort. When it was done and he released her there was no visible mark upon her skin-yet- but it would burn white-hot soon enough.

Regina pulled her arm back through the bars and stumbled back from the cell door. He was pleased to note the slight tremble of her hand as she stared at the unmarred but unequivocally marked flesh.

"Your 'White Knight' won't be able to save you this time, I'm afraid."


	4. Chapter 4

_Regina smoothed her hand across the page, fingertips tracing the lines of the unfamiliar rune. It was a curious thing, a straight line crossed by two bars on the bottom and one at the top with a small sort of dip in the middle of it. On the opposite page there was an intricate drawing of a birch leaf, beneath which were scrawled words but she didn't yet know how to read them. "What's this one for? It's sort of pretty, isn't it?"_

"_That, is a summoning spell. Qui Shin."_

"_Q-what?"_

"_A wraith. Soul sucker. That, dearie, is only for the worst sort of vengeance."_

########

_'Getting reeeeally tired of this bullshit.' _Red thought as consciousness came swimming dizzily back to her. That was twice now in two days that she'd been clocked for trying to do the right thing. She was never going to be rid of the splitting headache lancing through her skull. She might just throttle Regina herself, save a whole lot of-

_'Oh gods, Regina!'_

Red lurched to her feet, hitting the door back into the sheriff's office at a staggering run that made it swing on its hinges. There was no metallic taste of blood on the air, which at least was reassuring. Just lingering traces of the man who'd knocked her out and fear. Sweet sticky fear that made the wolf inside her raise its head in keen interest.

The office was empty, only peeling paint an empty desks and Regina, safe on the cot in her cell. The coffee maker in the corner burbled, no doubt running on a timer, and Red's tensed muscles relaxed.

"What happened? Are you alright?"

Red approached the cell slowly, realising here was the source of the fear stuck in her nose. It rolled off the tense woman in waves as she sat staring at something on the palm of her own hand. She might not have even noticed Red was there, for all the interest she paid her.

"No, I'm as far from alright as one can possibly be." Regina said finally, placid tone at odds with her words.

Red tilted her head, not understanding, and Regina held up the hand she had been focused on so the girl could see it. There was some symbol etched in the skin there, angry and red, and it almost seemed to glow in the shadow ridden cell's dim light.

"What's that?"

"Something very, very bad."

########

"Where is he? Where the _hell_ is he?"

Emma paced restlessly outside Gold's shop, legitimately closed for the first time she could remember. The door was locked, the lights extinguished, and no amount of pounding on the windows had made the man they sought appear. He wasn't at the diner. He wasn't at home. He wasn't here, unless he had super human patience for incessant knocking, and now she worried she had missed her window of opportunity. He must have bolted, gone into hiding. Not that she could imagine why; As near as she could tell it all began and ended with him but no one seemed so hold him any ill will. If anything the town's people were a little in awe of him; The same sort of awe one might hold for a caged lion, but awe none the less.

"I'm sure he'll be back." Snow said, watching her daughter's antics with a furrowed brow. "Where would he go? If we can even leave. I really can't imagine him testing the barrier himself."

Emma made a noise that was almost a growl, continuing to pace until Snow physically moved to block her path. She placed her hands on Emma's shoulders as the blond drew up short, smiling even though the crease between her brows didn't ease. "Hey. Can we talk?"

Emma scowled, looking down at her own booted feet. How was it this woman, who she had seen as a friend only a few short days ago, could make her feel so young? "What, now? Can't it wait?"

"No. No it can't. Emma, _Emma_, you're my daughter. I want to talk to you. I want to know you. I know that we have talked, that we have spent time together, but we didn't _know_ it. And now we do and I just- Please, I want to talk to you."

David (Or was it James now? She thought she'd heard someone call him that but she just couldn't remember.) joined them, a reassuring presence at Snow's shoulder, and they both regarded her with such earnest wonder that she felt the stirrings of guilt in her gut. "Okay. What do you want to talk about?"

"We've waited for this moment for so long. And it's here, and we're finally together, and Emma, I can't help but think you aren't happy about it."

"I am! I've spent my whole life wanting this." Emma sighed, dearly wishing she could be anywhere else, having any other conversation than this one. She would gladly slay another dragon if it meant she didn't have to stand here, trying to put her feeling into words. There wasn't any way to say it that wouldn't hurt them. "But you have to understand- For the last twenty-eight years, all I knew was that you sent me away."

Snow's expression softened, her thumbs circling in a comforting way through the supple leather that covered Emma's arms, and it ached. Oh it ached, to be touched like this, by a mother. It was a luxury she'd never before experienced. "We did that to give you your best shot. We wanted you, Emma. We always wanted you. But if we'd kept you, you would have been cursed too."

"But we would have been together." Emma pulled away from them, arms wrapping round to hug herself. Her lips quirked in a small smile, to soften the blow, though she was sure it didn't help much. "You did it for everyone, because that's who you are. Leaders, heroes, whatever. And that's great, and wonderful and amazing but it doesn't change the fact that for my entire life I've been alone."

Whatever Snow was going to say was cut off by the click of a cane on hard cement and a jauntily whistled tune, some old nursery rhyme that Emma couldn't quite place. She turned to see Gold strolling jovially towards them and relief seeped through her limbs even as she put her game face on.

"What's this? The Charming family reunited at last? Come to thank me, have you dearie?"

"Hardly." Emma wished suddenly she hadn't left the sword at the apartment, if only to have something to hold in her hands. It would make it a lot easier to fight the urge to wrap them around his neck. "What did you do? What was that purple haze you brought?"

Gold pointed a single finger skyward with a flourish. He was entirely too pleased about something, nearly vibrating with some inner joy. "You know. Magic."

"Why?" Snow asked.

"Not telling."

The ground shook suddenly beneath their feet, every transformer on the block, and beyond for all Emma could see, exploding in a shower of sparks that sent them scrambling, Emma instinctively throwing her arms out to cover Snow and David round the both of them.

"The hell was that?"

Gold was unmoved, leaning against his cane with deep, utter calm, and said as though remarking on the weather, "That is my gift to you, Snow. _That_ is going to take care of Regina."

Emma recovered, meeting the man's dark, smirking eyes with growing horror clutching at her chest. So stupid. While they'd been waiting, having their little heart to heart, he'd been off stirring more havoc.

"Tick-tock, Miss Swan. Best to run, if I were you dearie. You won't want to miss this."

########

Emma was gone before Rumpelstiltskin had even finished speaking and it was all Snow could do to keep up with her. There were screams everywhere as presumably the entire town lost power, sparks flying from downed power lines and all manner of debris left in the wake of whatever it was Rumpelstiltskin had unleashed, but it was all a blur of extraneous background noise as she fought not to loose sight of the gold and red streak that was her daughter.

The sheriff's station looked as if it had been gutted, the door off its hinges and random bits of its innards-Chairs, paperwork, window screens, all meaningless drivel now- strewn across the parking lot. The sheriff's cruiser was flipped over on its back, now a useless hunk of twisted metal.

Inside was as bad, the entire front railing of the cell block ripped free and cast as carelessly aside as a child's toy. Red was on her knees by the little table that supported the coffee maker, one of the few items in the room left miraculously untouched, staring wide eyed at the giant hooded spectre that was connected to Regina by an unsettling beam of light. All Snow could see of the figure beneath the cloak were two skeletal arms, still clung to by rotting leathery flesh. It reeked like nothing Snow had ever experienced before, blood and must and meat past its time.

Emma shouted at it, hurling one of the few office chairs that remained intact at the creatures back, and it whirled on her, leaving the former queen gasping. It was distracted just long enough to send the blond flying into James' arms, both sprawling to the floor, then went right back to it, unaffected.

Snow didn't know what it was, didn't know what it was taking, but somehow she was going to stop it. She had real adrenalin flooding her system for the first time since she had become Mary Margaret and it was wondrous to finally feel herself again. The princess who acted, who _did_, fearless. She cast around for something, anything, but other than the splintered furniture and smashed computer there was nothing but the coffee maker and an aerosol can of ant spray rolling across the floor.

An aerosol can... the part of her memory that belonged to Mary Margret tingled with awareness and she snatched the can up.

"Red, give me your lighter!"

"W-what?"

"Your lighter, quick!"

Red frantically patted her pockets, fishing out the little silver zippo and tossing it over. Snow caught it deftly and flicked it open, lighting it.

"HEY!" The creature didn't look round, intent on its victim and Snow pressed down on the can's spray button, directing it at the flickering flame. The gush of fire did the trick, drawing forth an inhuman scream before the spectral figure seemed to curl in on itself and shoot out the office window in a hail of shattering glass.

Regina crumpled to her knees and Snow was suddenly jostled out of the way as Emma ran by her to get to the woman's side.

She let the can drop from her hands as she watched her daughter, watched the tender way Emma's hands cradled her greatest enemy's face, held her close, finally linking their hands together and pulling the woman to her feet.

She was never going to be okay with that, Snow thought, watching the way Regina sank into Emma's arms. There was too much pain there. Whether or not Regina had changed at all was debatable but either way didn't stop Snow from seeing the woman who had stood over her, laughing while James lay bleeding, every time she looked at her.

"What was that thing?" Red asked, suddenly at Snow's elbow.

"A Wraith. Soul sucker." Regina's voice rasped as she spoke, her skin pallid, and Snow felt a cold shiver slither down her spine. Soul sucker? That's what it had wanted, what that strange light had been. Regina's soul.

"Did I-"

"Kill it? No. It'll recover and then it will be back. It will never stop until it gets its prey-Me."

"How do we kill it then?" Emma asked, watching the woman in her arms with soft green eyes. It made Snow's stomach turn in knots and it took all the willpower she could muster not to try and snatch her daughter away.

"You don't. You can't kill what's already dead."

"Then we have a problem."

"No, _we_ don't." Snow looked around at Charming, her noble prince, always the calm center to her more fiery emotions, in shock. His jaw muscles were tense, angry, more livid than she could ever remember seeing him and she wondered what had finally made his infinite patience hit rock bottom. "Regina does."

"You want to let her die?" Snow asked, gaping at him.

"Why not?" There was a sheen to his eyes, not quite tears but close. "Then it goes away and we're safe. Our family could finally be _safe_."

He wasn't, in that moment, James the charming prince or even David the well intending coward, just a father. A father scared for his daughter and desperate enough to do the unthinkable to protect her.

Snow could sympathize.

"She's not dying." Emma's eyes were hard as she glared at her father, fingers still twined through Regina's, and under different circumstances it might have been adorable how alike they were. They had the same stubborn jaw, the same fierce, protective spirit. In another world she would have been her daddy's girl, but now it looked like they might just come to blows.

Snow chanced a glance at Regina, who was being strangely quiet while they discussed whether she should live or die, and found brown eyes staring back at her. The woman inclined her head, not putting voice to the question but Snow could imagine the words all the same, the familiar biting timbre; _'And what say you, dearest Snow? Would you have me die as well?'_

It _would_ be easy wouldn't it? They would be rid of the wraith and Regina all in one.

But one look at her daughter and Snow knew Emma would never forgive them if they stood by and allowed that to come to pass. And whatever her personal feelings on the subject were she couldn't lose her daughter. Not again.

"Charming, no. There has to be another way."

"There might be- I have one last trick that just might do it." Regina said, stronger now.

Snow gripped Jame's bicep, quelling the protests she knew were still raging within him. It hurt, to see the borderline betrayal etched on his face-and she didn't like the idea of going along with any plan of Regina's either- but in what choice did they have, really? "Let's have it then."

########

The mayor's office was dark, like much of the rest of the town, but Regina seemed to know exactly where she was going even without the benefit of light. She weaved gracefully around the furniture, zeroing in on a large, leathery hat box in the corner by her desk that Emma had noticed before but never really took note of. She had always assumed it was just more decoration. The mayor was one for excessive embellishment.

"What's that?" She asked as Regina settled the box atop her desk, scattering the papers and nick knacks that covered the wooden surface everywhere.

"A hat. A hatter's hat, to be precise."

"A hatter- Wait, wait, as in 'Mad as'? You telling me _Alice in Wonderland_ is a part of this mess too?"

Regina lifted the lid, revealing a rather innocuous looking velvet top hat. She lifted it free with extreme care,smoothing her fingers across the brim. "I don't know anything about any 'Alice', but yes. Wonderland is another world, like the one we come from. One of many."

One of many. There was so much about that statement that Emma wasn't okay with but that could wait. "Okay. So how the hell is a hat supposed to help us?"

"It's going to open a portal. Back to our world. And we're going to push the wraith through it. If it still exists, there's no one left there for it to harm anyway. And if it doesn't... Well, that's banishing it to oblivion."

"You don't know?"

"The curse wasn't exactly explicit with those sort of details. Intentionally so I imagine, given who made it." Regina's shoulders lifted in a little shrug. "To be honest I didn't really care about what might happen to our world at the time. It was more a desperate, last straw sort of thing."

Some day they were going to have to talk about that. Emma still didn't know exactly what went down and Regina-Nor Snow, for that matter- hadn't been particularly forthcoming since that first confession, whispered in the dark. Someone had died. Everyone had been hurt. All was bad all around.

Emma pulled the hat from Regina's hands, tossing it on the desk in a way that made the brunette scowl darkly. The expression melted away as Emma kissed her, hard and fast and just a little bit needy.

"Don't die, okay?" Emma said when she finally pulled away, mustering up bravado she didn't particularly feel. Maybe third round of heroics was the charm? Or was it fourth? She'd lost track.

"That's never the plan, dear."

########

Regina had tried not to shudder with distaste when Charming arrived with his burning broomsticks, but she would have sworn his lips bore a mean little smirk all the same.

It was crude but effective, Snow and her Prince the first line of defense with their improvised torches, Emma, Regina and the hat the whole thing depended on surrounded by a wall of flame lit round the railing in the middle of the room (And when had Snow become such a fire bug?).

If she had been able to get the hat to work on the first go, it might have been enough to buy them all the time they needed. As it was, the wailing, unearthly creature was bearing down on them, bound to break through at any moment, and the hat only spun and flopped uselessly in her hands while she sat on her knees before it.

Emma was doing a weird sort of dance, torn between using her body as a human shield and trying to keep an eye on what Regina was doing. "Any time now would be good."

"I'm trying. Magic's different here."

_She stared at the candle with all the intensity she could muster, making the wick the sole center of all her attention, but it steadfastly refused to burst in to flames._

"_You'll never light it like that, dearie. It's not enough just to will it. Magic is feeling. It's emotion."_

"_What do you mean?"_

"_How did it feel, that first time? When you sent her away?"_

_Like rage. Sadness. Frustration. Like it was enough. She'd had enough and she just couldn't take it anymore. And there it was again, that rush, the warm glow. Magic. It was intoxicating, sweeter than kisses, more intense than lust, every vice she had ever indulged rolled into one and it pooled liquid hot in her belly. The candle suddenly flared to life._

"_Ah, see? Remember that feeling, find where it lives inside you. That's magic."_

But that feeling wasn't the right one anymore, not in this world. The magic Rumpel had brought here was formed from the essence of true love. But how the hell was she supposed to rewire her entire mode of thinking _here_, with a beast out for her soul breathing down her neck and the shouting and the smoke and the fear, all pressing in on her all at once? It was too much. "I can't- I can't, It's not working!"

And then Emma was there, her hand wrapped around Regina's arm firm and reassuring. "You can."

Purple smoke erupted from the hat and it began to spin, faster and faster. They both gasped, jumping back. _'Was that me or you?'_ Regina thought, glancing at Emma to see the blond staring back at her just as confused.

They scrambled to their feet, watching the portal grow wider and wider in the floor, and then the wraith had broken past James' and Snow's increasingly feeble defenses. Time seemed to slow to a crawl as Emma pushed Regina to the side and she watched the creature be sucked into the spinning purple vortex, a long skeletal hand wrapping around the blonde's ankle as it went and pulling her in after it. It took only a fraction of a second, in which Regina realized she simply couldn't survive one more loss, a fraction of a second in which she was once again a scared young woman standing in a stable watching her lover's heart crushed before her eyes, to make the decision to plunge in after her.

########

The pain that lanced through Jame's chest as he landed on the once again solid floor was nothing compared to the pain that squeezed his heart as he realized that not only had he lost his daughter again but his wife as well, she having been quicker to the punch than he had. They'd slipped right through his fingers, along with that vile, evil woman they never should have been trying to protect in the first place. He slapped his fist against the floor, a wale of pain and rage ripping from his throat.

When he rolled to his side and freed the hat from beneath him he saw a hole had been punched straight through the top of it, the velvet crinkled and ruined.

"Mom?"

He looked up to see Henry, Granny and Red hot on the boy's heels, frozen in the entryway. "What happened? Where are they?" Then smaller, sounding his ten years for the first time since James had known him, "Grandpa, where are they?"

And James, the father who had never had a chance to be a dad, a grandfather but not really, didn't know what to tell him.


	5. Chapter 5

_The curse he had begun to lay down the architecture for was going to require a being of extreme power to enact it, that much he knew from the get go. Power and sacrifice._

_Couldn't be himself, for he had nothing left to give. Could have possibly been one of the number of mortal beings in their world gifted with magical talents, but assuming any even had strength enough that still left entirely too much up to chance. Perhaps one might grow into a suitable candidate, perhaps not. Freewill was such a bothersome thing._

_There was, of course, one sure fire way to ensure the creation of the sort of person he needed. It would have to be female, couldn't risk it baring any resemblance to Bae, and he couldn't be present for its rearing, not until it was ready to learn how to use all that power inside it. Arrangements would have to be made, away from the mother. Familial bonds were wily beasts, unpredictable and best not to be trusted._

_When the miller's daughter came to him, desperate and pleading like so many other girls before her, it was the perfect opportunity. She had agreed to the terms without properly thinking them through, as desperate souls were wont to do, and in this instance that probably should have arose his concerns but he too was more bothered with the outcome of this particular deal than with the means it took to get there._

_There was no pretense, no coupling, only magic and when it was done she took the power he'd given her in exchange and used it to ensnare a modestly wealthy lord. She passed the child off as his, securing the bumbling fool and her new station with marriage and Rumpelstiltskin put it out of mind to focus on other deals and plans until the time came to collect his investment._

_The girl could scheme, he'd give her that. The lavish home and life she'd stolen for herself with the simple tools he'd given her were really quite impressive._

_It was a beautiful house and a beautiful bassinet and a beautiful baby the portly nobleman was cooing over when Rumpelstiltskin materialised in the nursery. The room was decorated with all manner of toys, a handsome wooden rocking horse and a near menagerie of stuffed things, and fine curtains and blankets in pinks and whites._

_Cora either hadn't bothered to tell her dear husband of the looming separation or they had in fact, during the some odd nine months she'd carried the child, grown attached and were planning to double cross him. One didn't arrange such a luxurious room for a child they knew they were giving up._

_He bared his teeth in a feral parody of a smile. "That's mine, dearie."_

########

Regina opened her eyes to an inky black blanket of unfamiliar stars and immediately closed them again as her vision swam in a nauseatingly dizzy fashion. Her head was pounding and there was something small but unpleasant digging into her lower back, below hands that tingled with numbness from being awkwardly positioned beneath her.

And, particularly troubling because she couldn't recall any reason why they should be, her feet and hands were bound with coarse rope that made her still healing wrists burn and itch.

After she'd had a moment to process things it occurred to her that the night sky she had seen upon waking, though vastly different from Storybrooke's, wasn't actually unfamiliar at all. It was the same one she'd seen nightly for a little over half of her life.

_Home_. They'd fallen through the portal into the Enchanted Forest. It still existed.

And there was magic, the familiar kind she'd once wrapped herself up in so easily. It coiled black and tempting at the edge of her awareness.

Someone stirred beside her, jostling her shoulder, and she remembered Emma-brave, sweet Emma- had fallen in before her. She was alive, at least, if not well.

Regina turned over to curl into the warm body, gratefully pressing her face into the crook of her blessedly still living lover's neck, and realised the soft flesh she was nuzzling, while familiar, definitely did not belong to Emma. The blond's skin always smelled crisp-Like the green soap she favored, Irish something or other- and of lingering leather and other things she could only define simply as _Emma_. The sheriff certainly never indulged in perfumes, least of all this sweet, flowery whatever-it-was.

She peeked out from beneath her eyelids to find quite a different pair of green eyes staring back at her, wide and startled, the pretty little jaw beneath them slack and gaping.

"What's the matter, dear? I already corrupted the daughter. I thought I may as well go for the full set." She moved as though to push closer, lips pursed, and Snow flung herself backwards, flopping fishlike for her hands and feet were bound as well.

Regina cackled, though the echo of sound within her skull made her temples throb. Oh yes. This was going to be fun.

"Regina, stop traumatizing my mother. We've got bigger issues."

Emma. She was on Regina's other side, sitting with her tied feet stretched before her and arms squirming feebly behind her while she seethed at something sitting opposite the dead grass and sundry underbrush that had become their bed.

There was a camp fire, Regina realised (And she was on the verge of developing something like a phobia), the orange glow of it dancing on Emma's fair skin. She strained and wiggled her torso until she was sitting as well. The vertical motion made her head swim in a way that threatened to send her toppling over again and her fingers burned painfully as full blood flow returned to them.

There was a woman-the apparent object of Emma's ire- sitting perched on a moss ridden log on the far side of the crackling flames with a sword resting across her well armored knees. She had dark hair tied back away from her face and pretty almond eyes that glittered almost black as they regarded the threesome unwaveringly. There was a crude looking tent at her back and just beyond the fire's light the dark, shuffling shadows of horses.

The crest on the woman's breast plate was vaguely familiar, but Regina couldn't focus enough to place it.

"Why-What did you do?" Regina asked, having some vague notion of the blond having offended some inane local custom (And it bothered her a great deal that there were still people here to offend, as she'd assumed the curse had taken the entire world along for the ride, but that was too much to deal with just yet.) while her companions lay unconscious.

"They think we killed their prince. The wraith- It must've..." Emma trailed off, either unable or unwilling to complete the thought.

It was only then Regina remembered the wraith had come through before them and she flinched, longing to twist and see if her palm still bore the mark. She didn't feel anything beneath her curling fingertips but she wouldn't be fully reassured until she'd taken a good look.

Then Emma's words fully sunk in and sickness that had nothing to do with a probable concussion rolled in her stomach.

She had killed and thieved and cursed but she couldn't say she had ever before been responsible for the eternal damming of another human being's _soul_. It didn't make it better, that her other victims had presumably gone on to a happy enough afterlife, but this was somehow so much worse.

Regina turned so that she was face to the ground and wretched, empty stomach heaving dryly.

"Regina!"

"I think she might have hit her head, look, just there, is she bleed-"

"QUIET!"

The world was a swirl of color and sound and somewhere far away she heard the slick whisp of steel on steel, a whumping as something hard and solid met soft flesh. Presumably the warrior woman had made some threat on Emma and Snow, but Regina was too lost in the kaleidoscope of her own head to pay much attention.

_"It traps their souls forever, dearie. No rest, no peace. Alone. It's a fate worse than death, truly."_

She'd considered using it, in her darker moments. Thought about what it might be like to put such torment on Snow. There was good reason why she had never been able to follow through with it.

Some acts were unthinkable even for wretched, evil things.

When the world had righted itself once again Regina found Emma had scooted close, watching her with brows knit tight in concern.

"Hey. Are you okay?" The blond whispered softly, and Regina's heart ached so she thought it might just burst. Had she always felt guilt so strongly or was it a result of having been separated from the organ so long, her emotions making up for lost time?

_Not worth it. I'm Not worth it, fool girl._

"Fine, dear. You needn't worry for me."

"When you're feeling better do you think you could...?" Emma wiggled her feet pointedly. "You know, poof? Magic."

Regina poked around at the power curled inside her and knew that she could, and more, but recoiled at the thought. If she set it free, if she went back to that place, she wasn't sure she would be able to claw her way back out again.

What might she do this time? What if she hurt Emma? Or Snow, who was so close and complacent she wouldn't even have to exert any effort to have her screaming, dying...

_No_.

"No." She said, hoping her anxiety would hide the lie. "My powers still aren't working like they used to."

"I could, you know, grope you or something if that would help." Emma said, wiggling her eyebrows and ignoring her mother's disgusted snort.

Remembering their apparent dual effort with the hat, Regina smiled wanly. Whatever the hell that had all been about probably didn't exist in this world. And she still wasn't certain if it had been Emma or Emma's influence over _her_ that had finally done the trick. "No, thank you dear but I highly doubt that would help us in this instance."

"Well, I'm all for trying. If you change your mind."

Snow groaned, burying her face against her knees.

########

The hat sat between them on the tabletop, slouching pathetically and looking more like garbage than a powerful magical artifact. The edges around the hole punched straight through the top had begun to fray and little bits of string hung everywhere.

Henry had the book open in his lap to the story of the mad hatter, but the crazed man in the illustration didn't look like anyone he had ever seen before. "Who do you think he is?"

James shrugged, scrubbing a hand through his hair. "I don't know. I never met him- I didn't even know such a thing as a hatter existed. I mean, David me did, he read Alice in Wonderland in college." Except he had never actually been to college, or really done any of the things he so vividly remembered from his youth in this world. It was all a fabrication. "But I- The prince, didn't"

"We have to find him. Maybe he can fix it."

"I wouldn't even know where to start."

Henry fixed him with a stare that was very much Emma. "Sure you do. You're having a low point, every hero does. You just need to think. He's gotta be in town somewhere, right?"

"The shelter." James said suddenly, smacking his hand down on the table with enough force to make the hat jump. "Maybe he's there somewhere, we could look-"

He was already making plans, all but forgetting the boy smiling at him from across the table as the new feeling of purpose took him over. Whatever David had been, the Prince was a man of action.

########

_"I want a new deal!" Cora was pleading on her knees, every inch the desperate mother. Rumpelstiltskin, however, only had eyes for the baby cradled in his arms, with her dark curl of hair and big brown eyes. She hadn't fussed not once since he'd scooped her up, merely gazed at him with a kind of wonder while chewing on her own tiny fist._

_"I have no further use for deals with you, dearie. I have what I need right here."_

_"Please, I'll give you anything. Just let me keep her. We named her-We love her..."_

_The 'we' rang false. He suspected someone did love the girl, but it was more likely the wealthy husband Cora was so desperate to hold on to than the woman herself._

_"Anything?"_

_Rumpelstiltskin looked at her, seeing not her physical form but the twisting branches of possibility that stretched into her future. A different outcome for each, but the path trod much the same for all. He smiled, a little titter of a giggle escaping his lips._

_He mightn't need the nursemaid after all. This woman was going to break their daughter all on her own._

_"Very well. You may raise the child; On one condition."_

_It was all semantics, of course. If she had taken the time to mull it over she might have realised he never handed over ownership._

_Or she didn't care. It didn't matter either way; He'd be back to claim his property all the same._

_"Thank you, thank you, anything you ask."_

_"I want her name."_

_########_


End file.
